Aza's Calling
by elfgirl931
Summary: Zevran is not ready when his beloved Warden Commander announces it is time for her Calling. Very sad and implied character death. Written in an attempt to break writer's block.


Zevran always thought bunking at an inn was infinitely better than sleeping outside. Years of traveling with the Wardens had not softened his dislike for resting on cold hard ground, and the weather tonight, he reflected with a glance at the snow-flecked window, was even more reason to want to be inside.

Tonight Aza was quiet, as she had been for the last few weeks. They'd set out abruptly at the beginning of the month, seemingl y without telling anyone in the Grey Warden chain of command – and Aza had not wished to elaborate. Zevran would not pry, and followed her without comment or question, as he always had – but his curiosity was beginning to get the better of him.

After eating a sub-par dinner in their room, the pair sat on the floor in companionable silence, staring into the fire. Zevran sipped lazily at a glass of wine, and Aza nursed a tankard of ale. "So, _mi_ _tesorina_, are you going to tell me where we are headed this time? It is not like you to not include me in your daring plans and schemes, I must say." He reached over to smooth a bit of hair out of her eyes, but Aza abruptly batted his hand away.

"Leave it," she said tersely. "It doesn't much matter anyway."

"_Mi amora_, is something troubling you?" he finally asked, the casual tone of his voice betraying his internal concern. "You've been a bit more… how shall I say, _thorny_ than usual of late."

Aza said nothing for a few minutes. "I've been having the dreams again," she finally replied in a toneless voice.

"But, you have had them since I have known you, yes?"

"_Yes,_ but it's different now." In their early years together, Zevran would have taken her silence as the end of the conversation, but he had learned to wait. Aza had always taken her time measuring her words, and would be hurried by no one. Finally she said, still not looking at him, "I hear a voice in my dreams. Like it was during the Blight, only stronger. Just calling my name again and again."

In the ensuing pause, Zevran found himself studying his lover's profile as though he'd never seen her before. Her hair was still the same sandy color between brown and blond, but with strands of silver woven into the braids. The blocky tattoos marking her face hadn't faded with the years, and neither had the thinner ones on her neck that he'd done for her. There were tiny wrinkles at the corners of her eyes and mouth, but her gray eyes were as sharp as ever. He took in the sight of her arms, strong and tanned and lined with scars. She looked the same to him. Twenty years and more, and she was still his beautiful Aza. Suddenly he felt as though he had to drink in the sight of her like a man dying in a desert, because it was the last time he'd ever see her.

"It's time for me to go. To my Calling," she finally whispered, putting her hand over his.

"No!" Zevran blurted without thought, without reason. No cajoling, no slyness or compliments, just the knowledge that he _could not let this happen._ It could not be happening, and as long as he denied it, it would not happen.

"Zev, I've been telling you for years that this was inevitable," Aza answered wearily. "You've always known it would happen one day."

"That does not mean that I am ready for it," he answered, barely above a whisper.

"How do you think I feel?" she snapped. In spite of himself, Zevran managed to smile. His rose would always have her thorns.

"I am sorry." Silence reigned for a while more, and he takes her other hand and strokes it lightly with the tips of his fingers. He studies her blunt fingertips and bitten fingernails, and then at her sturdy wrists and up her arms and neck and really dares to _look _at her face. He sees for the first time how the Taint has ever so slightly shadowed Aza's face (how has he missed it before?). Her hair was thinning, and Zevran recalls how it has been breaking when he runs his hands through it and braids it. There are shadows beneath her eyes that have never been there before, and her lips had grown pale. There is no denying the beginning of the end, though it will destroy him.

"My heart, my moon and stars, I am not ready," he bursts out again, his voice breaking just a little at the last word. Aza turns her body to him, looking him in the eye at last, and wraps her arms around him. He gathers her to him as close as he can, trying to tell himself that his eyes are _not_ filling with tears – he is simply too old for that sort of nonsense.

"I will never be ready to be away from you," she says fiercely. "But this has to be done. You know it does. Would you remember me as wasting away into a ghoul?" He has no answer for that. "When I am gone, think of all the good times we had. I wouldn't trade a single minute of it, you know that. You've shown me so many things, how to be happy and how learn and how to live a life. Remember that."

Again he has no answer, for it is she who has shown him how to live, how to find joy and purpose and how to love through the long years. Instead he kisses her and they end up lying together on the floor in front of the fire, content to give up words for sensations. There is tenderness beyond words in their caresses this night, and they each choose to ignore the fact that both are shedding tears.

Afterwards, they crawl into the bed and lie as close as possible, her head pillowed on his chest. After caressing her arms and back for a time, he dares to ask the question he's been dreading. "When?" he whispers to her. Aza does not answer him, and he thinks she has already fallen asleep.

In the morning she is gone. There is a note sitting on her pillow: _I will wear your earring to the last, my Zev. Do not follow me._

Zevran knows the way to Orzammar – he intends to catch up with her quickly, though she thinks herself so cunning. If his Aza intends to disappear into the dark, then she will not do so alone.


End file.
